Word Games

Midway through the Whitney’s 120-work, 40-year retrospective, “Lawrence Weiner: As Far as the Eye Can See,” I saw an unsuspecting viewer being reprimanded by a guard. He had just stepped on Mr. Weiner’s “One Pint Gloss White Lacquer Poured Directly Upon the Floor and Allowed to Dry.” Conceived in 1968, but executed, once again, recently at the Whitney, the sculpture is exactly what its title suggests. The museum guard, whose command of the English language was not perfect, shouted, “No step! No step! No step!” Taken aback, looking first at the guard and then at the sculpture, the viewer apologized: “I didn’t understand. I didn’t see it. There was no rope around it.” The guard sighed. “I understand,” she said, her words trailing off. She shook her head and adjusted her body against the gallery wall.The guard’s and viewer’s frustrations with this exhibition — which attempts to dissolve the distinctions between life and art — mirrored my own. And those frustrations point to one of the major problems with conceptual art and with conceptual artists in general: They want to have their art and eat it too; but they refuse to allow viewers to do either.Organized by the chief curator at the Whitney, Donna De Salvo, and the senior curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, Anna Goldstein, “As Far as the Eye Can See” was designed and installed in close collaboration with the artist. And it is executed as deftly and slickly as a Super Bowl halftime commercial.The show perpetuates the century-long strain of thought that a can of paint poured on the floor is not art, unless — under the guidance of an acknowledged artist such as Lawrence Weiner — it is poured on the floor of a major museum. Even then it is not exactly what one could designate as art — if by “art” you mean a singular work of singular importance created by an individual with singular talents. However, in recognition of these facts — that a can of paint poured on a museum floor both is and is not art — and in recognition of the artist’s, curators’, and museum’s wisdom to acknowledge said facts, we must not step on it.Mr. Weiner, who was born in the Bronx in 1942, is considered by many to be a founding father of Postminimalist conceptual art. A stream of contradictions, he is an artist who does not want his art to be considered art in a traditional sense. His non-art art includes statements stenciled on the walls; a series of 19 identical manhole covers each bearing the text “IN DIRECT LINE WITH ANOTHER & THE NEXT,” installed throughout lower Manhattan; mechanically spray painted shaped cavases, and a piece of limestone from the Brooklyn Bridge, sitting on top of a table. Like most artists, conceptual or otherwise, however, he wants his non-art to be purchased and installed in museums. This is a familiar trap for artists who do not have the skills to make paintings, sculptures, or films, but who want to be recognized as artists for their engagement with the tradition of knocking art off its pedestal. This makes sound and perfect sense: The more art knocked off its pedestals, the more empty pedestals available for the art that knocked it off. Mr. Weiner, who is also not a poet, not surprisingly has chosen language as his medium.Although it also includes videos, a wall of posters, an occasional sculpture, and vitrines stuffed with objects, books, drawings, and ephemera, “As Far as the Eye Can See” comprises mostly text trumpeted across the walls in capital letters. The show, which generally must be read, is a string of clamoring aphorisms and directives, including “A Glacier Vandalized” (1969), “10lbs. Mercury Tossed From Finland to Sweden” (1970), and the show’s subtitle, “As Far as the Eye Can See” (1988), which spreads across the Whitney’s façade in large yellow letters outlined in red.Occasionally, in the show, Mr. Weiner’s directives are carried out (the art is constructed), either by himself or by someone else, rather than just written on the walls (for the artist, all three versions are equally valid). “Two Minutes of Spray Paint Directly Upon the Floor From a Standard Aerosol Spray Can” (1968) is executed at the Whitney in hot pink on gray cement. “A 36″ x 36″ Removal to the Lathing or Support Wall of Plaster or Wallboard From a Wall” (1968) occupies the center of a movable wall. “A Wall Cratered by a Single Shotgun Blast,” in the collection of Carl Andre, and also from 1968, is BB-sized holes surrounding a single small crater.Yet, for a show subtitled “As Far as the Eye Can See,” there is not much here to look at. Most of the show — as if spawned from ironic fortune cookies — is made up of cryptic one-liners. But even for anyone interested in language or typography, the exhibition falters. Its strings of word games make the Whitney’s glowing red exit signs, with their spare, clear directives, shine like salient beacons amid a sea of conceptual banter.“As Far as the Eye Can See,” even as an art historical fact, is rather sterile and stale. Mr. Weiner’s fragmentary art has been likened to the graphic design of the Russian Constructivists, Dada poetry, and Socratic philosophy, but it lacks the power and intelligence — visual, poetic, or philosophic — found in the work of any of those movements. And despite the show’s spare, graphic cleanliness, Mr. Weiner’s statements tend to compete and to clash against one another on the gallery walls. The strength of the one is lost to the din of the many.But none of this is really of any importance. In conceptual art the artwork’s form doesn’t really matter. A description of the artwork will work just as well as an actual encounter. Mr. Weiner’s art can be brought to fruition in your imagination. These are all aspects contributing to its built-in charm; so, despite the curators’ and artist’s efforts to convince you otherwise, you don’t actually have to go to the museum to have a valid experience with the work on view.In fact, if the artist’s “Statement of Intent,” penned in 1969, is taken at its word, it could be argued that this show need not ever have been mounted. Upon its publication, Mr. Weiner’s “Statement of Intent” became a founding document of conceptual art. Its purpose was to render meaningless both artistic authorship and the primacy and individuality of the art object. (Never mind that Duchamp, with his Readymades, had already banged that drum more than 50 years earlier.) In it, Mr. Weiner states not only that the work of art need not be made by the artist, but also that “the work need not be built.” It can exist, spoken or written, merely as language. Mr. Weiner’s art, according to Mr. Weiner, can be made by the artist, by someone else, or not at all. I vote for not at all.Until February 10 (945 Madison Ave. at 75th Street, 212-570-3600).

Word Games

Word Games

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